The sad soundtrack for a cancelled game
Plus MAR10, WWE 2K25, new Lorcana decks, and Kirby history part 2.
Hello there! This week in the newsletter we’re listening to music from a game we’ll never play, diving into WWE 2K25, trying out new Lorcana decks and continuing our deep dive on Kirby history. But also…
Yesterday was MAR10 Day, which may be the most contrived commercial holiday there is. It’s different from Mario’s birthday, which we tend to observe in September to mark the release of Super Mario Bros, which turns 40 this year. In truth, the day really only marks the fact that Nintendo noticed a cute coincidence. I could forgive the tortured calendar shenanigans if there was anything about March 10 to get excited about, but as usual there was very little. We did get the Mario 3 soundtrack added to the Nintendo Music app, as well as the reveal of a new Mario Kart LEGO for grown-ups, but hopefully next month’s Switch 2 reveal will feature more exciting news to celebrate the big man’s 40th.
Funeral music for Earthblade
By Tim
More than a decade ago, I found what would become one of my all-time favorite games in a very unexpected place. The Ouya, an extremely short-lived console that I championed as a panacea to the AAA obsession of the mainstream but which flopped almost immediately, was filled with brilliant ideas that were presented poorly. But one game was absolutely immaculate and fully-formed; the arrow-shooting party combat platformer TowerFall.
I was still playing it five years later with any friend who would tolerate it, by which point it had been released in expanded form on PS4. But I was also aware that the lead developer and her friends were preparing a new game with a similar look and feel, but focused on a single-player non-combat experience. That game turned out to be Celeste, which I loved just as much.
So when the core development team rebranded as Extremely OK Games, and in 2021 announced a huge pixel “explor-action” adventure named Earthblade, I was wrapt. Unfortunately it was not to be, with lead dev Maddy Thorson announcing the game’s cancellation in January. But over the weekend composer Lena Raine, who made the incredible music for Celeste and many other games, released an album of music from Earthblade, giving us a mysterious taste of a world we’ll likely never see.
It’s strange listening to music from a game you haven’t played, but in this case it’s a riveting experience. The nine tracks are edited and transitioned to run together like a concept album, and it feels as though it could be the backing for a 30 minute trailer or tour of the game. While listening, I found myself imagining a game where I’d usually be remembering one.
Cords evoke a green and natural world while harsher more robotic synth sounds point to something artificial. There’s intrigue in the strings, potentially something spooky or spiritual in the vocals, and if I had to guess some kind of techno forest or jungle. Certainly desert saxophone.
Ultimately, I’m sure it’s a good thing that Thorson and co hit the brakes on a project they didn’t feel was heading where they wanted to go. But between the brief look we got at the game’s art and gameplay, and this great music from Raine, I’m keener than ever for a new vision from this incredible team.
What to play
Game Pass had some additions in the last week, including celebrated deck building roguelike Monster Train, and dungeon-crawling shooter Enter the Dungeon, both of which are available on the Standard tier. Space hospital sim Galacticare has come down from Ultimate to Standard, while sci-fi farming sim One Lonely Outpost is an Ultimate-only addition. Also keep an eye out later this week for Mullet Madjack (pictured), an absolutely unhinged first-person shooter with a 90s anime aesthetic, which is coming to Game Pass Ultimate.
Nintendo has added two consequential Game Boy titles to its Switch Online service. First is Mario’s Picross, the very first Picross puzzle game, which is turning 30 this month. It was created by Jupiter, the developer that makes Picross games to this day. The second game is Donkey Kong, which begins as a simple portable remake of the classic arcade game, but then morphs into an expansive puzzle platformer. It’s a precursor to the later Mario vs Donkey Kong series, but arguably better.
Free on the Epic Games Store this week is Them’s Fighting Herds. The name alone is good enough to get this game for free, but it’s a 2D fighting game where adorable animals straight up murder each other.
From The City to The Island
By Alice
There is a lot to love about the new WWE 2K25 game. It’s got a solid tutorial system, there are actual new features (groundbreaking, for an annual sports game) and there are so many little easter eggs and details that I’m sure WWE fans will enjoy. I have no idea who most of these characters are, and just hope they all have a nice time.
However, there is one thing that’s not to love, and as an NBA 2K player, I feel like I need to apologise to WWE 2K players for not warning them: The Island.
The Island is a brand new feature in WWE 2K25, where Roman Reigns is trying to find a worthy protege or something, so hopeful wrestlers from around the world have gathered on an island full of shopping opportunities to fight each other.
It’ll sound familiar to NBA 2K players, because it’s basically the city, only a bit better because the story for why it’s on an island makes sense. The City is just a menu that takes a long time to navigate (with maximum advertising exposure). The Island is its own new thing that almost makes sense. However, like The City, The Island still absolutely sucks to navigate. My first five minutes after the intro were just spent wandering around, trying to work out where I was supposed to go, only finding store after store selling cosmetics (such as slides for around eight real life Australian dollars). The fights are fun, but they don’t seem to be the focus of The Island, only capitalism.
There are ways to make The City/Island suck less: make travelling around faster, put more things to do there, nuke it from space and replace it with a menu, maybe something to do with cars. Those are just some ideas off the top of my head. All but one still allows 2K to make obscene profits off micro transactions, but means players will actually enjoy being there.
The doubling down on this format, though, does kill all hope I had for it improving or disappearing in NBA 2K26.
That said, the rest of WWE 2K25 is excellent, and absolutely worth it for wrestling and fighting game fans.
Bricks, Boards and Beginnings
by Alice
Last week I had the chance to play the new Lorcana Archazia’s Island starter decks (which they now call single-player decks for some reason). The Belle and Beast deck is blue/red, the characters included were a good array of the classics, each with nice and interesting art.
It’s objectively a pretty good set.
The problem is that Lorcana hasn’t yet had that “wow” moment. There doesn't seem to be any particularly meaningful difference between the colours yet. I have no allegiance to any combination, and can’t really tell the difference between the different coloured decks. I haven’t yet played a card that made a particularly big impact on a game. I’m just playing characters to get ink and maybe attack other characters to get to the goal.
I’m sure that wow moment is coming, Lorcana has all the ingredients for something amazing. But I still remember the moment Magic the Gathering clicked for me, on my first Selesnya deck in Return to Ravnica back in 2012. The deck just worked so well together, and there was such a clear differentiation between how you played a Selesnya (green/white deck) over Golgari (green/black). There are specific blue cards I played against more than a decade ago, whose effects I still remember. I haven’t yet encountered a memorable card like that in Lorcana.
It’s the same with Pokemon. I only recently got into the Pokemon TCG, but it was once again specific cards and synergies that made that game click for me.
Lorcana is still too focussed on being able to play any card in any deck at any time, or perhaps the game isn’t putting enough effort into educating players about how to build an exciting deck. Either way, while I still enjoy Lorcana, beyond appealing to Disney fans, I don’t think they’ve yet made it into a game that will excite TCG players. I look forward to playing the set that brings it all together.
Retro Esoterica
by Tim
Kirby part 2: 8-bit and 16-bit consoles
One year after his debut on Game Boy, in 1993, Kirby arrived on a home console. But not on the Super Nintendo. Kirby’s Adventure ran on the 10-year-old NES, and yet managed to surpass many of its SNES contemporaries when it came to my vibes, offering a detailed and wildly coloured world with a great soundtrack. It also introduced Kirby’s signature copy ability; inhale an enemy, and you can replicate their offensive capability be it fire, spikes, beams or lasers. Called Hoshi no Kirby: Yume no Izumi no Monogatari in Japan (or Kirby of the Stars: The Tale of the Fountain of Dreams), it also greatly expanded the lore and story surrounding the adorable pink puff.
The popularity of Adventure meant Kirby was certain to arrive on the SNES ASAP. But, as on the Game Boy, he was initially used as a mascot for spinoffs. In 1994 and 1995 he starred in Kirby’s Dream Course and Kirby’s Avalanche; the former being an isometric HAL golf game and the latter being a reskin of Compile’s Puyo Puyo puzzler. Like Sega, which released Puyo Puyo internationally as Doctor Robotnik’s Mean Bean Machine, Nintendo appears to have judged 90s Americans and Europeans unworthy of Arle and co’s magical journey.
Kirby finally made a splash in his own 16-bit platformer game in 1996, but once again was quite late to the party; Kirby Super Star released for SNES in the shadow of the new Nintendo 64. It’s a brilliant game that combines nine different smaller experiences, each of them a distinct take on the established Kirby gameplay. There’s a remake of the first game but with copy abilities, a full subterranean Metroid-like, a racing game, an arena and much more.
And finally, as the industry appeared to be making an irreversible change to 3D design, HAL released a love letter to sidescrollers in 1997’s Dream Land 3. Only originally available in Japan and North America, it’s a huge game and a good example of the Nintendo approach to difficulty and depth, with levels being mostly breezy but true completion requiring planning and precision. The three animal friends from Dream Land 2 return, plus a new cat, bird and jellyfish, making for a huge number of potential ability combinations. You can also sacrifice health to summon Gooey, a horrific new friend who’s like a malformed Kirby with a gross tongue, who can be controlled by a second player. But he’s nowhere near as concerning as the secret final boss Zero, who attacks by blasting his own hot diseased blood through cuts in his massive eyeball, and who can only be fought if you’ve found the hidden objective in every level throughout the game. A beautiful SNES game with a crayon aesthetic, it doesn’t hold up perfectly in HD but should be at the top of the list for anyone with a Switch Online subscription looking for a 16-bit fix.
Next time: 3D? Nah.